


double-headed monster with a mind of its own

by reogulus



Series: take us down and all apart [2]
Category: Succession (TV 2018)
Genre: Canon-Typical Behavior, Consensual But Not Safe Or Sane, Dom/sub Undertones, Dysfunctional Family, Episode: s02e10 This Is Not For Tears, F/M, Frottage, Hand & Finger Kink, Oral Fixation, Sibling Incest, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-11
Updated: 2020-06-11
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:13:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,203
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24666682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reogulus/pseuds/reogulus
Summary: “Right, so,” he swallows, she watches as his Adam’s apple bobs up and down to punctuate the pause. “What? You’re—you’re gonna pass your whore to me like you’re passing the salt?”
Relationships: Kendall Roy/Siobhan "Shiv" Roy
Series: take us down and all apart [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1783504
Comments: 4
Kudos: 17





	double-headed monster with a mind of its own

**Author's Note:**

> Set during 2.10 after the dinner where Kendall was announced as sacrifice; a loosely connected sequel to the events between Shiv and Kendall in pre-canon Shanghai as detailed in [a rocky heart for breaking teeth](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23062048).

Shiv drinks too much at dinner, eats barely anything at all. In the deafening silence of that table as the light fades from twilight purple to pitch black, she constructs a looped ritual as if to insulate herself from the ground zero of impact; her hand is quick to empty her wine glass into her mouth in a few long, efficient sips and the waitstaff tops it up fastidiously from behind her.

Logan does not look at her, his eyes trained squarely on the dinner plate. Later, Shiv can’t recall exactly what it was, the protein methodically cut up into bites and disappeared into her father’s mouth. Tom, sitting across from her, doesn’t raise his head from the food either. He hasn’t said a word to her since she carried to him the message of exoneration. Some part of her already knows, come bedtime he will say something about his snoring and poor quality of sleep as of late. She won’t make a big deal out of it, in any case there is no shortage of available cabins for him to crash with his toiletries bag and pajamas. This is probably how it will be between them until they return to New York; it’s a fragile moratorium, a reprieve for which she is grateful—she is relieved and she feels shame in that, despite her best effort not to.

With that thought, Shiv drains another glass. To her right, out of her periphery she sees Greg stealing concerned glances at her, then at Kendall, then back at her. Kendall—Kendall, who has picked up an alcoholic beverage at the start of every family event since the Summer Palace, is reaching past his untouched wine glass for the water only. Shiv’s glad for the sheer size of Greg between them, blocking most of her brother out of her line of sight.

Halfway through her fifth glass Shiv knows she has gone over the limit—overboard, if she wants to use that word for herself—all around her the plates are getting cleared away, Logan is the first to leave, after standing up and saying some platitudes for a goodbye to the table. There is a round of audible exhales of exhaustion as soon as her dad is out of earshot. She signals towards a waiter and pushes her barely touched plate aside, her other hand still half-wrapped around the wine glass. And then Shiv steels herself—she sits there, unmoving, not when Tom walks over to her and tells her exactly what she’d predicted he’d say, and she nods yes and tells him she’ll see him in the morning. In lieu of a kiss goodnight he gives her bare shoulder a gentle squeeze, the way he knows she likes it when he gives her massages. It sends a shiver down her spine. She shakes her head slightly as if to press reset on all her senses.

Eventually Greg leaves with everyone else, after Roman and Gerri, Connor and Willa have disappeared in pairs. Shiv finds herself sitting alone with Kendall, one seat over, and against all her Roy instincts it’s somehow easier to breathe like this, with him and only him next to her. The staff have quietly wrapped up their clean-up duty; Kendall with his water half-full, Shiv with her wine half-empty, and the table is stripped bare otherwise.

“Walk you back?” She waits for him to talk first, and he does, of course he does.

She nods, throws back the rest of her wine. To her surprise, maybe she hasn’t sat there long enough; she still finds herself gripping the back of her chair to steady herself when she stands up. The best she can do is not to stumble.

“C’mon,” he steps over, extends his hand to her but doesn’t quite get close to her. She doesn’t bother taking it, keeps her feet pointed straight ahead, gets ahead of him in two and a half steps; like how for the whole of sixth grade she refused to let him open the car door for her, it’s a symbolic gesture. It means something because she fucking wants it to—her reasoning for the point made can always be supplied at a more convenient time.

Their footsteps are soundless on the deck as they move through the hallways and past the Marcia-imprinted refit. It’s late enough in the day to say that Marcia won’t be joining them again—not today, maybe not even any time after, perhaps she too could melt like Rhea, though Shiv always knew and resented her for being made of sterner stuff. Kendall follows her to the last corner to turn before she gets to her suite—she counts her steps until the they pivot at the turn, and then she stops. There are many doors down the corridor here, but none of them is occupied—she’d made sure of that, when she and Tom got the first pick of the cabins the day before. She’d wanted to ensure maximum privacy for what she’d planned for her fantasy, that wishlist in her Notes app for her and Tom and the girl she paid. It’s as good as gone up in smoke now.

“What?” Kendall asks, in a tone that signals his utter lack of expectations for what she might tell him.

“I’m just thinking,” Shiv runs her hand through her hair—it’s gone miserable, shapeless and flat from the day she’s had, and she should shower and get it blown out so she can at least face the brutality to come tomorrow with some dignity, some resemblance of her normal routine. “Do you need to go to bed early tonight?”

She asks that—she marvels at the ease with which the words come out of her mouth, as if they are suddenly very young again and can’t just wriggle free from the bounds of mom’s curfew, as if she has the audacity to play the obtuse, here and now. Kendall just looks at her, still like a glass of water gone tepid in his palm after the ice has melted.

“I think I can do whatever I want here before the helicopter lands.”

She feels as though the air in her brain starts to thin a little upon hearing that from Kendall, and the deep breath she subsequently draws in is almost out of survival instincts. She leans back against the wall to let her legs relax a little from the tension that runs through her, from the back of her neck to the balls of her feet. It’s a steel rod that props her up, helps to keep her form so that she can trudge through this day without deflating into a jumbled mess; but she’s at the end of holding it all in.

“I paid a girl here,” Shiv says, knowing full well she’s probably fucking it all up as soon as the words come out of her. But she continues, “I can call her up any time tonight. Was supposed to be for me and Tom, you know, I wanted to make it up to him after that shitstorm in DC.”

“Why?”

Not _what_ because there is no element of surprise, it’s been a long, long time since any of them would be shocked by how the others choose to use—choose to do violence to—their bodies. Kendall’s gaze holds steady, trained on her like a sniper rifle with an empty chamber—the laser pointer is projected on her forehead, with real pressure and unreal threat, or so Shiv can tell herself. The idea has been brewing in her mind since she summoned Kendall to Logan’s bedroom, unable to look away from him as he put down his headphones and walked off the main deck.

“I don’t think Tom needs this anymore,” Shiv keeps her face neutral as she says this, but she finds it necessary to cross her arms before her chest and she can’t quite manage to look at Kendall. Her mind takes stock and shoves down the tinge of guilt pointing to the obvious fact that she’d already made it up to her husband, in whatever is the polar opposite of a self-serving, self-indulgent way. “But the girl is available and probably will say yes if you want to ask,” she shrugs, but her shoulders remain tense. “It’s just an idea. I can give her your number, or not. She’s done this professionally before, so it’ll be totally discreet.”

“Right, so,” he swallows, she watches as his Adam’s apple bobs up and down to punctuate the pause. “What? You’re—you’re gonna pass your whore to me like you’re passing the salt?”

“Fuck you,” one fewer glass of wine might have found Shiv feeling actually offended by this ungratefulness, but she feels her lips stretch and curl into a small smile as she says that, and a brief moment of—relief, or something akin to contentment—settles in her stomach as she sees the smile mirrored on her brother’s face.

But then the moment passes, and it occurs to Shiv that she hates seeing this brand new lightness to him, his eyes entirely clear, his hands open and relaxed with half-curled fingers—the resentment is riled up in her, she feels it rising up to her chest like it’s a particularly nasty kind of nausea that tends to find her on the morning of a bad hangover.

She turns her face away from him, arms still crossed. A few seconds of silence passes between them—and within that few seconds of silence, she knows that she should go back to her cabin, get her feet to carry her further down the hallway where she can shower and at least try to get some sleep.

But then he speaks, as he moves closer to her, wraps a hand around her arm, and she feels his warmth through his palm on her skin. “I’m sorry about Tom, Shiv.”

Later, this is the last thing she will allow herself to remember—the acceptable end of her night with him.

They’ve never talked about Shanghai, because there is nothing to talk about and it never happened again anyway. And yet, Kendall finds the memory taking over his thoughts in that moment, something about the wounded look of rageful exhaustion in Shiv’s eyes that triggers it with a deadly precision. It isn’t meant to be hurtful but he can tell there’s no taking it back now that she will read into it her own meaning. But he truly is sorry, for what will feel like an eventuality when they are back in the city, the embers of a marriage that’s simply run out of time. And by then, Shiv may not accept any comfort or consolation from him of all people.

He can feel his hands shaking, an involuntary response to the long-suppressed images of Shiv’s arousal, where her hands had been on his body, the kiss that barely lasted a second but toppled into something so much more. The frantic desperation of diving headfirst into a poor decision, following through and doubling down on a mistaken beginning just so there’s a chance of making it right in the end; the part of her that reminds him most of their dad.

Kendall wraps his fingers around her upper arm slightly tighter, so as to conceal the slight trembling in his fingertips from her perception. Shiv turns around to look at him again; of course she’d think he’s squeezing her for attention. He keeps his lips pursed, looks up to meet her eyes. He doesn’t want to think about what he’s hoping to find in them, but almost immediately he feels it, the small tremor in her shoulder, inches above his index finger. They are both remembering against their will.

“Let’s not,” she swallows, and Kendall can see the gears turning in her head, whatever remains functional in her intoxication. He keeps his hand on her, relaxes his hand just so that she can shake him off and walk away if that’s what she comes to decide.

“Let’s not bring Tom into this,” is what she ends up saying.

He nods, if only to let the words hang between them for another moment, to be chewed thoroughly. It’s more for her benefit than for his.

Kendall keeps his hand on her. The tighter grip has given way to more of a hover, to make explicit the point that he’s not keeping Shiv there, that as everything else falls away around them, it’s not too late for her to stop at least _this_.

He won’t ask her, she knows that much; the choice is her body’s, to stay or walk, or to go to him—like she did in Shanghai. There is no question if nothing is asked; the less they speak, the easier it may be to forget.

Once again he absolves himself of the choice—the shameful impossibility of the choice, the sting of tears burning in her nasal cavity with her head bowed in front of her father, the very pretense of a choice presented to her in one hand and the real power stripped from her by the other, and the chips fall where they may all the same.

Shiv grits her teeth, figures she’s still sufficiently drunk to follow through with this. If not, there’s more to drink in her suite. To hell with the hangover; whatever state she will be in tonight, she knows she will feel worse than in the morning. It’s nice, Shiv supposes, to have this horrible morsel of certainty, when she is so far from solid ground—figuratively and literally.

Whatever Shiv does—has done, to her brother—she can barely make the thought coherent to herself—will not be worse than what their father will put him through. _So how’s that for consolation?_

She cannot be her own judge, jury or executioner.

In a moment of aimlessness, Shiv sees the colorful glowing bulbs on the tree-like fixture, out of the corner of her eye from around the corner of the corridor. And then Marcia’s voice starts ringing her head out of nowhere— _it was too much, Siobhan—_

She snaps that train of thought in half, squeezes her eyes shut for a beat, and then brushes Kendall’s hand off her arm.

“Don’t say another word,” her voice is hushed and uneven, but somehow still carries the sharpness of a command. Kendall lifts his head, his downcast eyes shift to look up at her. He nods.

The way Shiv frees herself from his half-grip is not as rough as he expected; Kendall realizes that only after catching himself surprised by the gentleness of the brush. Maybe she should have slapped him. Maybe he would have preferred it that way, or deserved it, or liked it.

“Follow me,” she keeps her voice between them, starts walking. From behind her Kendall sees her hands balled into fists. He knows her fingers would have been trembling otherwise—he knows his are, except a man at a dead end has no reason to hide.

The excruciating length of the hallway reminds him of how huge this yacht is, their naked feet measuring the distance to Shiv’s bedroom, step by step. It would have been ample time to reconsider, to make up an excuse and turn back, but breaking away takes effort—it is so much easier to go along, to take it, to have it happen to him.

They are mere steps away from the suite, now, having walked past the huge vases of fresh peonies. It’s deafeningly quiet all around them, the sounds of even their footsteps absorbed by the carpeting beneath their bare feet. And then, as if testing shark-infested waters with a bucket of bloody meat, Kendall reaches out to grab Shiv’s wrist just as her pace begins to quicken. She comes to a sudden halt, pulls her arm too hard and the force of the tug sends a jolt up his arm too, from his fingers around her to his wrist and then to his elbow.

Shiv turns to look at him, and it’s painfully obvious how pent up she is, so filled to the brim with emotions that she’d rather do without. It’s almost like they’re back at Tern Haven all over again. They stand there, both of them have gone very still with her wrist wrapped in his hand. He holds her gaze and counts down the seconds.

“Fuck,” finally she says, breathlessly. She brings up her free hand and shoves him towards the side, hard this time, almost vicious. Kendall stumbles gracelessly, his head tossed back and dangerously close to making ugly impact against the wall. The pot lights casting down on him are unbearably bright, too blinding and disorienting. Shiv has his hands pinned to his sides; he can only close his eyes to shield himself from it.

“Don’t you think I owe you fucking anything,” she presses her forehead against his and spits it out, a lie as emotionally and dramatically close to the truth as he’s ever heard one. He knows; he’s said it before, too, in front of their whole family. From her slightly parted lips her breath smells like the wine he never touched.

It’s all too easy, to use words would have been redundant. He nods again, and without opening his eyes, tilts his head ever so slightly, his mouth finds the angle and catches her lips.

The first thing Shiv does when they shuffle through the door is to turn off the lights. The colors of this room are entirely mismatched with where her head is, which is swimming and on the cusp of a migraine that will eventually find its way to her. Her heart is beating too fast for her to tolerate any more of the oversaturation and self-righteousness in the rich yellow décor all around. Left in the dark, Kendall has gone inert there in between the his-and-her closets, where he was when she’s stepped away to do everything to make it all easier for herself, standing with his head hung low.

Shiv goes back to Kendall, nudges him towards the couch. Her bed is not an option, a non-negotiable; she can’t bear the thought of having to sleep there after tonight next to Tom if she knows Kendall’s scent has been anywhere near it. He lies down, left calf carefully arranged off the side of the couch and right leg curled up to plant his foot on the soft fabric. She tosses the pillows aside and climbs atop him, her knee slides to fit snugly between his thighs. The heat of his crotch almost burns her through the thin fabric of her blue jumpsuit—she feels the heat rising in her cheeks, too.

“Get me out of this,” Shiv guides Kendall’s hand to the well-concealed back zipper of her outfit, and he doesn’t need much more than that, his fingers make quick work of the rest of it, effortless even in the pitch dark. His hand reaches into the opening to caress her lower back in careful strokes—she finds herself leaning into it, her back arched. Shiv lowers her head and lifts the halter top up and out of the way, the friction between the thin sweat on her skin and the fabric lasts but a second before dropping away. Seeing her breasts spilled out, Kendall draws in a sharp breath before thumbing over her nipples and taking a handful of her. It sends a wave of shudder down her spine; she leans over him, inches closer, her hand propped up on the arm of the couch next to his head.

The swell of Shiv’s breasts is a new sight to him, and Kendall reaches for them, unthinking, hands taking a life of their own as they roam over her naked torso. As she presses herself closer to him, he feels a new wave invasion of her knee at his crotch, the frottage enough to extract a stir and a moan out of him. He catches a white flash of Shiv’s teeth as she smiles, satisfied by his response. Then she retreats from him again, shimmies out of and kicks off her jumpsuit that hugged her curves so well. Now he’s fully dressed, still, in his linen shirt of light khaki and brown slacks of cotton, and she’s lowering herself back on top of him in nothing but a piece of lace between her thighs.

Kendall’s glad for the gag order; he doesn’t want to ask, doesn’t want to know how far she wants to take this, if this will be a reprise of Shanghai or a crescendo or nothing so binary. He knows what he wants, what he’s good at, to know his place and to execute what he’s told ought to be done. It’s all laid out before his eyes, _she_ ’s all laid out before him.

Kendall presses his lips to Shiv’s collarbone, plants a trail of kisses up her neck, buried in the scent of her perfume and makeup. There is no more room for thoughts, only instincts. She responds in kind, her palm firm and rough as she cups him through his trousers, her fingers pressing and massaging as he grows half-hard underneath.

“Shiv,” her name is the first thing he says, the only thing. He cranes his neck to try to reach her for a kiss, but misses as she tilts her head sideways, his eager, parted lips brush messily against the ends of her hair. She bears her weight on him, then, straddling his narrow hips but doesn’t move. Keeps him waiting in silence for half a minute, then plants a kiss on him, on the cheek this time, her hand cupping his face. Suddenly it feels as though all the blood in his body has gone cold.

Shiv doesn’t seem to notice his sudden stiffness, plants a trail of kisses up his jawline. When she reaches his sideburn, she nips on the shell of his ear, hard enough for him to gasp in recognition of a dulled pain.

“Don’t say anything, not even my name,” she declares again, her voice lowered to imply the possibility of punishment for another violation, before moving to kiss him on the lips.

The relative coarseness of Kendall’s shirt provides the barrier and the friction, both of which she needs to get through this. Shiv undoes a few buttons to see more of him, her eyes follow the color of desire that flushes his neck down to his chest. His hands are bracketed at her waist, kept there still and firm, faithful followers of the ups and downs of her movement as she grinds down on him. Not once does he try to unbutton his slacks or pull down his zipper; he’s quiet, pliant, perfect like this. She can’t think of any other feeling like this—to feel so thrilled and secured at once.

Shiv reaches a hand down between her thighs, pushing her panties aside to stroke her clit and inner folds, her fingertips drenched immediately. She bites down on her bottom lip to muffle her moans as much as she can, juts her hip up and out so the angle is better for Kendall to see, and hear—how wet she is, her fingers stretching herself out with ease, her wedding band under the knuckle of her left ring finger shines and glistens above her cunt as she uses her other hand to spread herself open and hold the strip of fabric out of the way. Her eyes are screwed shut so tight that he can see the creases around her eyes, her breathing quickens, a broken moan spills from her lips as her fingers reach further up, her wetness drips down where her pelvis meets her thigh. She comes like that in front of him, strands of hair flung across her cheek and nose, her thighs trembling so much that she would have toppled over backwards if he hasn’t held her in place.

He arches himself up, eager to rub his bulge against any part of her he can reach—anything for relief, but then she pulls out of herself, reaches forward to his mouth, and coaxes his mouth open with three fingers.

She burrows deeper into him, pressing down on his tongue, and soon enough he gags around her as she reaches near the back of his throat. She keeps him there, her other arm braced against the side of his head like a frame or a cradle. She keeps making him take it. At last, his hands go slack and fall away from her.

Kendall struggles, tries as hard as he can to breathe through his nose as much as he can—her scent fills him with every desperate, shallow breath he manages to take, her taste fills every corner his mouth. When the fingers are withdrawn he feels lightheaded and dizzy and he would need to lie down if he isn’t already, and after the world above him stops spinning he hears only the rustling of his trousers and underwear being tugged down, the feeling of Shiv’s hands on his erection. Her delicate fingers are wrapped around him, shiny with his spit, frantic but firm. The lubrication from his pre-come and his saliva are not quite enough to keep it all slick, the friction grows hotter and rougher on the side of uncomfortable, his cock grows harder amidst the rawness from the base to the head.

He bites down on his lip, hard, keeps his noises to a string of grunts and whines, all finetuned to the rhythm of her hands working his cock. It nearly drains all of him—to not to say her name, not even to beg or cry when she finally envelopes him in the much-needed wet heat of her mouth.

Shiv can feel Kendall getting close when he cards his hand through her sweat-dampened hair, his hips twitches so slightly as he fucks himself up further into her mouth. in that moment she pulls back, not because she didn’t want to have him come in her mouth but because she wants to take it in—the full view of him, drunk on sex and desperate, all of his clothes still haphazardly clinging to his body and his looking only more debauched for it.

He grabs hold of his shaft as she looks on, finally wrings the orgasm out of himself, with her mouth and hands getting him that far. His other hand is balled into a fist, wound so tightly that it almost brings back old memories of him—the version who tried so hard at everything all the time, who overshot the mark and brought her down with him. It’s her brother from another lifetime, not—this.

Shiv runs a hand over her face, from her mouth to her eyes to her forehead, then combs her hair back. She sits there a moment, both of them catching their breaths in silence. She counts the inhales and exhales—allows herself a slight turn towards him, enough to catch the rise-and-fall of his chest in her periphery, but her eyes go no further.

“Shiv.” He calls out to her, his voice level and calm, like it was at the dinner table. As if burned, she recoils from his voice; she can’t help it. Everything starts to slip away from her that much faster than before.

Shiv gets up from the couch before he does, disappears into the bathroom. Soon after, he hears the sound of water running. It’s easy enough to get redressed when he wasn’t fully undressed, only a few buttons to do, his underwear and trousers to pull up. Some parts of the fabric cling uncomfortably to his flesh, wet spots felt and not seen, and he understands perhaps that’s the whole point for her. The odd splatter of his semen left on the couch, the wrinkles in his shirt, what she left on the crotch of his slacks. Nothing anyone will miss in the morning, with much grander theatrics to come.

As Kendall steps foot out into the corridor, he thinks back to the dinner again. The brief sidelong glance he gave in Shiv’s direction, that went unmet but was responded via a hand tucking her hair back, as if it was only tickling her cheek as the wind blew. It’s the first and last time he tried to look at her directly at that table, and she’d shown her hand plainly, proven later in how she consumed herself inside rather than touching the food.

Something’s got to give, and the rest of it merely folds or unfolds. There is release and absolution in both giving and taking, but their family sees both sides only through a one-way mirror. Choose a side and then stick to it—it’s easier for everyone that way. It’s been what they were taught, time and time again since Kendall was old enough to remember.

With that, Kendall reaches the end of the hallway. He stops, looks over the deck to his left. The yacht glows in its entire magnificence, the overspill of luxurious orange-yellow lighting a stark contrast against the cold unforgiving seawater. If the moon is shining, it’s not bright enough to shine here; nonetheless, Kendall closes his eyes to imagine the moon in his mind, how its brightness penetrates through shrouds of clouds, the wheel of its light wrinkled and blurred atop the dark waters. The time is nigh.

Shiv turns on the shower. She lets it run a few minutes just so she has the comfort of white noise in her head. Ever so carefully, she slips out of her scrunched panties. It’s wet with her and stained by him. She rolls the fabric into her palm and squeezes it, tight, its smell mixing with the rising steam from the shower and suddenly the air is too thin in her head again.

Shiv tosses it into the trashcan, the swing top rocks back and forth before coming back in place. She pauses a second, her fingers curled into her palm, as she tries to wait a moment longer before opening the bathroom door. When she does turn the knob and lets the cold air flood in, her room is as dark as empty as she’d left it before going to dinner. Standing naked at her bathroom door, she is truly alone.

She leaves the door open, steps into the shower. Her lungs take to it soon enough, the cold air followed by the warm steam; in some way this helps Shiv feel balanced, even-keeled at last in a way she hasn’t been since stepping foot on this ship.

With that newfound assurance, she reaches between her legs again, rubs her clit hard and fast as if it’s penance, rough enough to extract a low whine. Shiv lifts her face to the showerhead, screws her eyes shut. As she fucks herself on her hand, she thinks of the smooth, velvety feel of Kendall’s throat under those same fingers. She comes again, this time with his name on her lips in barely a whimper, everything washed away and drowned out in the water.

**Author's Note:**

> Title is plucked from "Devil in a New Dress" by Kanye West ft. Rick Ross. 
> 
> I had half a mind to push the post-dinner scene in my other fic, [vacillation](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24102241), into NSFW territory, but it didn't quite feel right in the context and structure of that story overall. So I parked that thought and promptly forgot about it for however many weeks, and then everything somehow came together after I started writing the first scene a few nights ago, and then I figured I might as well build some continuity between this and the first Shiv/Ken smut fic I wrote. Anyway, I had fun with this one and I hope you enjoy reading it too!


End file.
